A Year of Change

Woot! We made it to England in one piece! The weather is beautiful and calls for a nice hoody. The sun and clouds have been fighting over the sky all day, but it's perfect, in my opinion!

Yesterday (Wednesday? It's weird, because I should have had two nights of sleep since then but I've only had one!) my parents dropped us off at LAX. I did very good and only got a little teary saying goodbye to them. It was still very hard, but I know I will see them again before too terribly long. The lady at the baggage counter set us up so I didn't have to pay extortionate fees for my many oversize suit cases. In the end, I only had to pay $100 for my three large bags that I checked. I carried a small roller suitcase and my laptop bag on the plane with me. It was a long flight, but thankfully Mick and I were able to get our tickets changed so that we were next to each other. We weren't able to see the seating chart before we purchased our tickets so we didn't know that there were only about 3 seats left on the plane and they were scattered all over. We were in the middle two seats of the center row, so we were squished, but together. I was pretty content because I got to watch about 5 hours of Glee.
After about 11 hours, we finally landed at Heathrow, walked about halfway across the airport, and got into separate lines for Passport Control. EU Passport holders, go this way, and non-EU passport holders, go that way! Mick went to the EU (European Union) line and I went the other way. He got through faster than I did and caught all our luggage at the carousel. I was really nervous waiting in line because I didn't know if they were going to interrogate me when they saw my marriage visa. But the guy who stamped my passport was really cool, just made sure than I knew I had to do more visa requirements after the wedding, which I already know about. I had my thumb print scanned and met Mick at the carousel. We were met by his mum and his step dad. His step dad had to run to work, so he grabbed a few suitcases and went on his way since not all the luggage would fit into one car. Then his mum helped us to the car with the rest of the stuff. We picked up ready meals and headed back to the house. I felt awful. When we had been walking through the airport I felt nauseous from lack of sleep. I felt like I wouldn't last five minutes without falling asleep. I hadn't slept at all on the plane and was paying for it!
But, after a bath and a sandwich, Mick and I both started to feel better. I dosed a bit on the couch throughout the afternoon, then we had our dinner and tried to stay awake until the sun went down, but since its summer, that means it doesn't go to bed until after 10pm! We finally went up at about 10:30 and it was still a bit twilight-y out. We slept hard and didn't wake until nearly 11am.

When I woke up this morning, Mick mumbled a sweet "happy anniversary" in my ear. I smiled and remembered it was our one year anniversary. A year ago, on this day, Mick picked me up at Heathrow Airport and we spent that magical month together. The past year has held a lot of ups and downs for our relationship, but more recently it has held a lot of ups. We're, of course, engaged, finally in the same place for good, and feeling very content with where we are. We didn't really do any celebrating today, because we were in charge of taking the dog out for a bit and we are leaving tonight (more travel, boo!). We did grab a quick lunch out, but that was about it. We will probably go down to the pub with his sister (Laura) tonight and grab a drink, as well. But we plan to celebrate for real next week once things have calmed down a bit.
Happy anniversary, babe. I love you more than ever and can't wait to be your wife soon! I'm so looking forward to building a home and family with you in the years to come.

Us almost exactly a year ago! (funny, he's wearing that same shirt today!)

Hope you guys all have a great weekend! We are heading to Kent this evening until the middle of next week to celebrate Mick's sister's birthday and see more of his family. I'll try to post while we are there and I promise to start taking pictures!